You will never be good enough.

But neither will I.

When it comes to God’s grace and mercy, you can’t earn it, I don’t deserve it. That is the point. If we could be good enough to earn God’s forgiveness and mercy, then I wouldn’t need Jesus.

I was having a conversation with the pastor at church and we were talking about the roles of grace and the law. How do we explain Christian ethics and lifestyle and what it means to live a Christian life. The conundrum is the balance and conflict between the two. I can’t earn forgiveness, and Paul talks time and again how the law brings death. Yet I know that the law is God’s standard. So what do I do with that?

Obeying the law won’t save me, it won’t earn me salvation or forgiveness. For if I could keep the law I would not need forgiveness. Without a doubt there is the danger of falling into legalism. It is way to easy to fall into looking at how I am keeping this law or that precept, and how you are not. Then next thing you know I start looking down my nose and judging you, because although you may be great at keeping laws 1-2-3, they’re not the ones I think you should be focused on keeping.

At the same time how do you encourage people to keep the law, not for what it does for them but because of whose laws they are? So I’m wondering if this makes sense? We should strive to keep the law, knowing we are going to fail. But still strive to keep the law because the law is God’s standard, shows the attributes of God, and pleases him. Not because God wants to be a wet blanket, but rather than the law is how the universe works.

Would you want someone you love to suffer for you?

So if we love God, wouldn’t we want, try, even strive to keep the law? 1- because it is God’s standard. 2-because it pleases God. 3- Because of all He has done for us. 4- my sin Jesus took on himself on Calvary, suffering for my sin, why would I want to make Him suffer more?

After all God does not need us to “behave” to bring him joy, although our obedience and worship brings him joy. We can’t earn God’s mercy, so why keep trying? It’s not about trying to earn Mercy from God we already have mercy as much as we will ever need.